Wednesday, October 19, 2016

Which Party Will Hold The Senate And House?

Which party is going to control the House and hold a majority in the Senate in January 2017? Even if you regard the presidential contest as over -- a proposition for which there is powerful evidence, including Donald Trump's current campaign message choices -- the answers to those questions are, respectively, mildly and very unclear.

The Trump campaign has a legitimate gripe against mainstream media for their nonstop coverage of the groping charges against him and their downplaying -- or complete blackout -- of the WikiLeaks and other revelations about Hillary Clinton and her supporters inside and outside the Obama administration. Does she really, as she swore under oath, have no recollection of key facts about her email servers?

Her advisers' contempt for the Roman Catholic faith and willingness to use politics and government to transform it should put a chill up the spine of anyone who thinks the Framers got it right with the First Amendment in banning the federal government from prohibiting the free exercise of religion.

Mainstream (and other) media were happy to give Trump lots of airtime in the primaries, while the Clinton folks, we learn, tried to manipulate the nomination process in his favor. But the First Amendment guarantees a free press, not a fair one. Any Republican candidate has to expect unfair treatment, and one vulnerable to damaging last-minute stories maybe shouldn't run.